♠️♠️ Suited Connector Saturday: When You're Not The Preflop Aggressor

♠️♠️ Suited Connector Saturday: When You’re Not the Preflop Aggressor

Most of the time in this series, we've been the preflop raiser.
Today, let’s flip that.

$1/$3 Live Cash
We’re in the Big Blind with 7♥️ 6♥️

MP opens to $15. We call.

Flop: 9♠️9♥️ 8♦️ ($31)

We check. MP bets $10.

🤔 What Are We Thinking Here?

Do we ever lead this flop? Maybe. But this hand is better served as a check-raise.

Now let’s break down the decision:

• Do we have value or a semi-bluff?
  Semi-bluff. We're not beating anything that bets for value.

• Where are we within our semi-bluffing range?
  Very near the top.
  We’ve got an open-ender with a backdoor flush draw — better than just two overs or pure backdoors.

This already puts raising squarely on the table.

But there’s more.

🔍 Let’s Look at Villain’s Range

What’s the average strength of their flop betting range?

We looked at paired boards yesterday in ♠️🗺️ Flop Play Friday: Texture of the Week — Paired Boards 

Plenty of overcards (AK, AQ, KQ)
Some straight draws with overcards (QT, QJ, JT)
Some small pairs (22-77)
Some strong made hands (TT-AA)

That’s good news. When a range contains lots of misses and weaker hands, it becomes a prime target for pressure — especially when we’re near the top of our bluffing range.

✅ So We Raise to $35

We apply pressure on weak hands now.
We threaten stacks on later streets.
And we keep villain uncomfortable when they’re holding the marginal part of their range.

Opponent calls

🌀 Turn: 2♣️ (Pot: $101)

What’s your first thought?

If that’s your instinct, we’ve got work to do.

Instead, you want to be thinking about concepts we’ve been drilling in this newsletter:

✅ "That didn’t change the texture."

✅ "I still have one of my best semi-bluffing candidates."

✅ "My opponent still has hands that will fold to pressure."
Think QT, QJ, AK/AQ, and underpairs that didn’t believe on the flop.

✅ I would be betting again with my value hands like 9x and 88, so I need to find some semi-bluffs

This is where low-stakes players lose value — they build the pot without a plan… then abandon it when they don’t immediately improve.

Strong players understand that bluffing isn’t a feeling — it’s a plan.

And we’re still on script.

💰 Let’s Talk Sizing

Last week in ♠️♠️ Suited Connector Saturday: Turning Draws Into Pressure and Profit, we covered turn sizing and how crucial it is to set up a credible river shove. Go through that exercise now, what’s a good size? Take 10 seconds to think about it.

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Since we have so much stack left behind ($450), we have options. We bet $100

• Pot on river = $301

• Our stack = $350

Perfect. A roughly pot-sized bet remains.

We bet $100. MP folds.

Reply to this email with your answer. You can just list the cards, or include a quick why for each — I’ll be responding with feedback today and tomorrow.

Let’s keep leveling up.

Stay sharp and curious,

— Mike

Meet Mike D. -- Poker Coach 

Want 1-on-1 help with turning suited connectors profitable?

Book a coaching session and we’ll have your opponents fearing monsters under the bed.
👇️ 

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